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"Back up," said Boba Fett quietly. "Do it slow, and you probably won't get hurt."
"Hurt?" Beside him, Bossk was gazing in wide-eyed fascination at the laser ca
"He's going to be vaporized!"
Zuckuss was unable to take his own gaze away from the death-bestowing machinery locked upon him. But he did manage to take one cautious step backward, then another; all the while the weapon's tracking systems followed his every move, shifting angle slightly to remain targeted.
A few more steps and Zuckuss was back with the other bounty hunters. "Stay here," Boba Fett told him.
"Don't worry." The stink of panic sweat seeped out of Zuckuss's gear. "I'm not going anywhere."
Boba Fett had already stepped past him, leaving Bossk and IG-88 behind as well. He strode without visible apprehension across the landing dock toward the ovoid resting above its glittering mesh. The laser ca
"It's been a long time." He stopped and spoke to the weapon itself, as though its charge-primed muzzle were a face masked like his, with the tracking systems as its all-seeing eyes. "A very long time."
The red indicator lights along the weapon's housing cooled from red, through a dull orange, down to a steady- state yellow. The optics and sensors of the tracking systems defocused slightly, as though the hand and mind behind the trigger had relaxed to a state of mere vigilance, rather than instantaneous aggression.
Slowly, the laser ca
From the intricate joins of the weapon's mounting, more steam lashed out, gathered, and dissipated in trailing wisps, indicating the presence of an old-style, liquid- based cooling system, primitive technology dating from the earliest days of the Republic. The laser ca
180 degrees around on its mounting, as though the tracking system optics were actually the eyes in a head made of pure destructive capacity.
A tail section, like a primitive saurian's, but made of segmented black metal and mounted by articulated bolts to the creature's hips, was the last thing to be dragged out of the craft. With its top section hinged back and its pilot standing before it, the resemblance to a giant egg was complete, as though it had just now cracked open to disgorge a new combination of living matter and lethal machinery.
Behind the stranger, the tail curled across the edge of the stiffened mesh. With one hand, the creature undipped a small keyboard device from the band of metal ru
"long ... time." The device's speaker crackled as the stranger held it up in front of himself. Underneath the synthesized words, the hissing of the steam from the laser ca
"YOU DO NOT ... SEEM TO AGE ...
BOBA FETT."
"Should I?" The statement amused him. "Time enough for that when I'm dead."
He could hear the other bounty hunters behind him.
Bossk's voice was louder than the rest "I don't like the looks of this... ."
The stranger was instantly transformed; Boba Fett knew that something had triggered a reaction sequence. On the housing of the laser ca
Boba Fett glanced over his shoulder and saw that Bossk had instinctively dropped his hand to the butt of the blaster slung at his hip; the Trandoshan always did that when something aroused his suspicions.
"Not a good idea," said Fett. With a nod of his helmet, he indicated Bossk's hand, frozen in place by the laser ca
Bossk took his hand away from his blaster.
"Good." Boba Fett looked toward Zuckuss and IG-88 as well. "Now our team is all here." "D'harhan and I go back a long way." Across the controls of the Slave I, Boba Fett's hands moved swiftly, setting the coordinates for dropping back out of hyperspace. "Longer than you can imagine."
"How come I've never heard of him?" The ship's cockpit area was small enough that Zuckuss had to remain standing in the hatchway behind Fett just to exchange a few words with him. "He seems very ... impressive."
Zuckuss had had a choice of traveling with Bossk and IG-88 in the Hound's Tooth, but the Trandoshan's worsening temper had pushed him into the Slave I instead.
Let the droid deal with him, Zuckuss had decided. Droids don't take all that snarling and muttering personally.
But heading toward the Shell Hutts' home base, a ring- shaped artificial planetoid called Circumtore, aboard the Slave I had proved even more u
It had taken a few moments for Zuckuss to realize that this intimidating and unfamiliar entity was only partially conscious at that moment. The square, heavily armored box mounted beneath the laser ca